What Is Context? ⚠️

[Joshe]

6 hours ago, UnbornTao said:

So - are you saying that space is the context? And by "objective aspect," do you mean that it may relate to or involve objects? If that's what you mean, then I agree.

Yes.

6 hours ago, UnbornTao said:

Space allows for the existence of objects. In your example, you might actually be referring to 'environment' or 'setting' - particular forms of space. These don't seem to be physical in themselves. Space isn't the distance between objects - distance is a function or parameter of space. So, as you say, describing these as 'features' of space does sound reasonable.

Yes, outer space is just the "possibility space" for things like distance between objects to exist. "Distance" would be a variable assigned to "content" within the space. 

6 hours ago, UnbornTao said:

I think you might be mistaking the notion of a "collection of content" as forming a context. It's a bit like saying: "putting domains of thought together creates the mind," or 'Language is comprised of symbolism and every language there is."

The things don't make up - or comprise - the context. Without the context in which they're found, the things don't exist.

The collections of content do comprise a particular context, because context cannot exist without content. But that does not mean content = context. Context isn't reducible to the things inside it. The possibility space and the things that arise in it are inseparable, which is why my definition includes content. My definition includes the space itself, the content, and the perception aspect. Together, these create "context". I think the definition needs all 3.

6 hours ago, UnbornTao said:

Even before it was invented, 'Chinese' was already possible once Language came into being. A particular unknown language might exist even though we know nothing about it. Or a new one could be invented!

Yes, this is what I meant by "dynamic". The possibility space can allow for an infinite number of configurations, but once you start to make distinctions by setting variables, constants, and constraints, the space takes on a particular shape, thus forming a context. But the possibility space itself is not sufficient for defining context IMO. 

6 hours ago, UnbornTao said:

Sorry, could you briefly clarify again the objective and subjective qualities? It might be so - but is context subjective and/or objective?

When you look at a small tree next to a big tree, the big tree is objectively bigger. The distinction is not subjective. The perception of the distinctions include both the subjective and objective content. I'm not sure though whether to call perception "content" though. The perception part of my definition could use some work. It might even be best left out, I'm not sure, but I feel like it has to somehow fit in. 

6 hours ago, UnbornTao said:

"The possibility for a domain of distinctions to exist" removes the focus from the elements within that possibility. Dynamic, nested, structure, variables, and constants are distinctions or 'features' that exist once the context is created. You'd be looking at the features or manifestations of context rather than at context itself. So there may be a secondary consideration.

I mentioned dynamic and nested as properties of the possibility space, not the content. "Context: a dynamic, nested possibility space, shaped by constraints and structured by variables and constants."

I think the disconnect is coming from my inclusion of content in my definition. I think we agree that context is the precondition for content, but the way I see it, you cannot exclude content from the definition because without content, there’s no distinction, and without distinction, there’s no context - all there is, is the void. Context only has meaning in relation to content.

So maybe you could say that the ultimate context has no content, and maybe we could call that the absolute context, but if we define that as context itself, we don't really capture what context is.

Context only becomes context when there’s content/distinctions inside it. No content, no context.

BTW, I'm no expert on this stuff. Engagement with this thread is my first go at this and I'm forming these ideas somewhat on the fly and from intuition. 

Edited August 23 by Joshe

[UnbornTao]

@Joshe Thank you. Besides, the despair and confusion are to be expected.

To me, context is the very possibility that allows new domains of distinctions to arise in the first place. That doesn't necessarily mean the distinctions are made right away, but that they can be made - like how science and particular languages could emerge once Language itself came into being. Possibility is open-ended; before "content", it's a kind of "void," as you said, in the sense that nothing has been actualized yet. But it isn't a thing - there's nothing "there" that constitutes the context. Is the context not what gives "content" its meaning?

In other words, context precedes the existence of the content within it.

For example, without a value context, where do you find "judgment"?

How could symbolism, literature, and art exist without the "space" for them to exist? That's the point. Without the context, they collapse into mere shapes, sounds, and images. The properties of a language or of communication - which exist thanks to Language - can be studied, but that already presupposes the wider background in which they appear.

One might even say we are conscious of context, though since it has no form (and yet is specific), it isn't perceived. It is a creative act of consciousness.

Yes, and "outer" is a particular distinction within space.

Right - though in my previous reply I said "comprise," I was confusing it with "compose." That's corrected now.

may edit at some point

Edited August 24 by UnbornTao

[Sugarcoat]

You need a self to have context. Because you feel like something, so you’re able to feel like there’s something beyond this immediacy, a context to this moment. Like: “right now I’m on planet earth”. You’ve never proved this in your direct experience. It’s you who assumes yourself as separate thus the world as separate, so it makes it possible to have all kinds of contexts.

Edited August 24 by Sugarcoat

[UnbornTao]

20 minutes ago, Sugarcoat said:

You need a self to have context. Because you feel like something, so you’re able to feel like there’s something beyond this immediacy, a context to this moment. Like: “right now I’m on planet earth”. You’ve never proved this in your direct experience. It’s you who assumes yourself as separate thus the world as separate, so it makes it possible to have all kinds of contexts.

Self itself may be a context. 

[Sugarcoat]

9 minutes ago, UnbornTao said:

Self itself may be a context. 

The word context makes me spontaneously imagine, in a visual way, like something that surrounds something else. Self seems more direct than that. But then, self could include the narrative on a time line we have about ourself, the story about ourselves: and that for sure seems like a context added on this immediate moment. So id agree with you, I’d say self is both context and this present, immediate “sense” (like a physical self)

[Keryo Koffa]

Contextuality is a Context, Contextability is a Context, Context is a Context
Phenomenologicality is as Contextual as Contextuality is Phenomenological
Abstracting Strange Loops into Tautology (deja vu), Tautonomy, Tautotelonogramy

Self-Determination where Context is Self-Contextualizing

[UnbornTao]

@Sugarcoat Physical self?

Maybe. I'd include that sense in the context. 

[UnbornTao]

@Keryo Koffa What is context?

[Sugarcoat]

7 minutes ago, UnbornTao said:

@Sugarcoat Physical self?

Maybe. I'd include that sense in the context. 

lol I don’t know how it is for others. But like a sense of “I’m physically here” maybe not physically but of some kind of substance…..

[Keryo Koffa]

53 minutes ago, UnbornTao said:

@Keryo Koffa What is context?

An associative telic attractor intentionally relating phenomenological overlaps through functional lenses.
A unitive predictive preference evaluator of experiential awareness conditioning creative transformation.
A distributive perception animating potential anticipations from growing gestalts forming familiar patterns.

Context is powerful, connecting a nebulous Consciousness as Intelligence, Meaning, Intention, Telos... everything
Context is like a Conscious Phenomenological Associativity, the Capacity to Intuitively understand Relate Feelings.

Context is:

• Feelings relating intuitive understandings.
• Intuition understanding relative feelings.
• Relations feeling understanding relatively.
• Understanding intuitively feeling relations.

Contextuality is the Capacity to Remember and Relate, to Distinguish and Frame in relation to Feeling or Intent.

Edited August 24 by Keryo Koffa

[UnbornTao]

37 minutes ago, Keryo Koffa said:

An associative telic attractor intentionally relating phenomenological overlaps through functional lenses.
A unitive predictive preference evaluator of experiential awareness conditioning creative transformation.
A distributive perception animating potential anticipations from growing gestalts forming familiar patterns.

Context is powerful, connecting a nebulous Consciousness as Intelligence, Meaning, Intention, Telos... everything
Context is like a Conscious Phenomenological Associativity, the Capacity to Intuitively understand Relate Feelings.

Context is:

• Feelings relating intuitive understandings.
• Intuition understanding relative feelings.
• Relations feeling understanding relatively.
• Understanding intuitively feeling relations.

Contextuality is the Capacity to Remember and Relate, to Distinguish and Frame in relation to Feeling or Intent.

My 🧠:

 

Edited August 24 by UnbornTao

[Sugarcoat]

51 minutes ago, Keryo Koffa said:

An associative telic attractor intentionally relating phenomenological overlaps through functional lenses.
A unitive predictive preference evaluator of experiential awareness conditioning creative transformation.
A distributive perception animating potential anticipations from growing gestalts forming familiar patterns.

Context is powerful, connecting a nebulous Consciousness as Intelligence, Meaning, Intention, Telos... everything
Context is like a Conscious Phenomenological Associativity, the Capacity to Intuitively understand Relate Feelings.

Context is:

• Feelings relating intuitive understandings.
• Intuition understanding relative feelings.
• Relations feeling understanding relatively.
• Understanding intuitively feeling relations.

Contextuality is the Capacity to Remember and Relate, to Distinguish and Frame in relation to Feeling or Intent.

You don’t understand that

[UnbornTao]

1 hour ago, Sugarcoat said:

lol I don’t know how it is for others. But like a sense of “I’m physically here” maybe not physically but of some kind of substance…..

Ha, just after reading your comment, I opened a random page of a book, and the first words I saw were "physical self." Take that, Carl!

If we think of context as analogous to space, then a self-context would be the room in which the self exists - including the interpretation of it as the receiver of perceptive input, which I assume you were pointing to in your claim. Context sounds abstract and detached, as if, but it can involve objects and related processes, including the body, perception, etc. Anyway, 'body' and 'self' - up for grabs.

[ExploringReality]

Everything arises in Context. But what is context arising in? What is the context of Context?

[Keryo Koffa]

34 minutes ago, Sugarcoat said:

You don’t understand that

On 6/21/2025 at 3:46 PM, Keryo Koffa said:

That is most categorically considerable, but is it factually verifiable?

1 hour ago, UnbornTao said:

My 🧠: #507

You need to flex those Tautology neuro-pathways!

Context-Capacity is how far awareness can maintain qualitative discernments before feedback-loops! 

Another Pointer is: Circumstantially (Constructing and) Repurposing Aware Experiences.

Edited August 24 by Keryo Koffa

[UnbornTao]

2 minutes ago, ExploringReality said:

Everything arises in Context. But what is context arising in? What is the context of Context?

Consciousness.

[ExploringReality]

3 minutes ago, UnbornTao said:

Consciousness.

Very good. Now keep kicking the can.

What is consciousness arising in?

[Sugarcoat]

8 minutes ago, Keryo Koffa said:

That is most categorically considerable, but is it factually verifiable?

If you truly understood you could translate it to simple terms that others can understand 

[Sugarcoat]

2 minutes ago, ExploringReality said:

Very good. Now keep kicking the can.

What is consciousness arising in?

In this. Arising in this, as this. All is this. There is only this. Nothing but this. This is everything. There’s just this — Some non dualist with 50 subscribers on YouTube holding monthly zoom meetings where the audience is like seniors who are anxious about approaching death and trying to escape through non duality 

Edited August 24 by Sugarcoat

[UnbornTao]

7 minutes ago, ExploringReality said:

Very good. Now keep kicking the can.

What is consciousness arising in?

That would involve speculation.

We need to have a few enlightenments first before we can truly "answer" those questions.

Edited August 24 by UnbornTao